Star Wars: The Force Awakens really is the gift that keeps on giving.

The film came out at the tail end of last year and shattered box office records, but there’s still plenty to chew over for fans of the galaxy far, far away.

The latest new revelation comes courtesy of ILM, the visual effects firm responsible for making the Millennium Falcon soar and igniting the Jedi lightsabers.

The CGI wizards have just released a stunning 45-image gallery showcasing some of the pre-production artwork JJ Abrams used to inspire his blockbuster epic.

Rick Carter, co-production designer on The Force Awakens, said of ILM’s approach to the work: “Each artist began to explore his individual response, and collectively, we began to answer, with our words and art.

Man bun? Skywalker goes Shoreditch. Image Picture ILM/Lucasfilm

“Out of our brainstorming sessions emerged visual imagery of where we might want to go and what it would look like when we got there.

“We were not merely illustrating scenes that already existed: we were initiating storytelling concepts through the visual images themselves.”

Alongside these images of scenes we all recognise from the finished Star Wars opus, there are sketches of sequences that never made it in front of the camera and oddities that changes throughout the production.

Darth Vader's castle Design work for a Star Wars scene we never got to see. Image Picture ILM/Lucasfilm

The sight of Luke Skywalker sporting an intergalactic man bun won’t be leaving us anytime soon, while TIE Fighters with fold-down wings for landing is something that’s never been seen before in a Star Wars film.

Most tantalising of all, however, is a glimpse at castle next to a tumbling lava river. This is apparently the home of none other than Darth Vader – maybe Adam Driver’s Kylo Ren came this close to visiting his grandad’s pad in The Force Awakens?

See a handful of these breathtaking Star Wars pictures below, then head over to ILM for the full set.